Jack Morris missed out on the Hall of Fame for the 15th and final time a little over two weeks ago. For someone who came so close — within eight percent of the 75 percent threshold in 2013 balloting — it might seem frustrating, but it sounds more like a relief to Jack Morris. Morris, though, says he is tired of being under the microscope. Via Mike Berardino of the Pioneer Press:

“Fifteen years ought to be long enough for anybody, you know?” Morris said. “If it’s not going to happen in 15 years, it’s not going to happen.”

Morris can still enter the Hall of Fame starting in December 2016, if the Veterans Committee deems him worthy. It’s hard to see Morris getting snubbed again by the Veterans Committee, particularly since Gil Hodges is the only player to get more than 50 percent of the vote to not eventually get into the Hall of Fame, according to Tom Tango. Tony Oliva had the second-highest vote percentage among snubs at 47 percent.

How does it feel being scrutinized at work by every higher-up, when you think you’re doing well? One thing Jack did do that many people don’t understand is he gave the bullpen a night off almost every game. In a 162 game season, it’s a big deal, but no, he just isn’t “worthy” of the Hall of Fame.

All I remember about him is that nobody on the other team seemed very pleased when it was his time to pitch in the rotation.

paperlions - Jan 25, 2014 at 2:14 PM

He averaged 7.1 IP/start over his career.

He averaged less than 1 out more per start than Dave Steib (6.87 IP), 1 out more per start than Tanana (6.71 IP), about 1/3 of an out more per start than Kevin Brown (6.99 IP), and about 1/3 of an out less than Steve Rogers (7.19)…..those are just random non-HOF pitchers I pulled that are contemporaries of Morris.

He really didn’t last longer than games than most decent starters during that time period.

Ask the players in his day their thoughts on the man. I am not just saying jibberish, I am just repeating what others had said about him during his time. Let me ask you this, what was his ERA from innings 1-3, then 4-6, then 7-9. My guess is many of those runs did come in innings 7-9, but you also remember it was a different age, and time in those days. They didn’t have baseball-reference, or the internet nitpicking each and every pitch Jack threw, like they can now.

And by the way Paperlions, Jack averaged 7.1 innings, and Verlander has averaged 6.66 IP in his career, and he is by far the better pitcher than Jack was. But Verlander’s WHIP is 1.1, and Jack’s was at 1.2. Jack also averaged just about 7.5 IP as a Tiger, it was later on in his career that his IP went down, but then again you would figure that, with age. But there is a reason why Sparky gave Jack the opening day nod for what, 6 years? Because he was reliable, and the Tigers’ best pitcher.

Kevin, you ask players of his day whatever you want and their perceptions still don’t change facts. People often think things that aren’t true: confirmation bias is a powerful emotional-cognitive force, and if one doesn’t ever bother to actually use objective measure, you are doomed to fall prey to it.

As a twins fan, I will never forget the 91 series. If it were up to me, you would be in just because of game 7 alone. It was amazing, incredible and awesome! Thanks for the memory Black Jack! I will never forget it.

As a White Sox fan, I will never forget the last game of the 1962 season. 19-year-old rookie center-fielder Brian McCall hit two home runs against the Yankees in his first big-league start, an 8-4 win over the 1st place Yankees. The White Sox finished 5th,and McCall got only one more start in his major league career, but if it were up to me, he would be in the Hall just because of game 162 alone. It was amazing, incredible and awesome (to this 8 year old, anyway). Thanks for the memory, Brian! I will never forget it.

I guess by ‘crazy stat line’ you mean going from a +286 OPS one year to a -61 the next… Brian McCall is an artist (I discovered that about ten years ago when I looked to see what had become of him), and quite an interesting guy. Besides being the first of 3 teen-age center-fielders to hit two homers in a game (I didn’t know that until just now!) (Griffey Jr and Harper have followed him), and besides the lasting memories I have of listening to his big game on my transistor radio, here are a couple of articles about him, his art, and his baseball:

i hate to say it but i guess the people who say jack’s career stats don’t quite get him in the hall are right, but you sure are right about that game.

jack was a home town boy made good coming home, who delivered the biggest win in twins history, which was also one of the best games in one of the best world series ever.

i believe he gave up about 8 hits in that game and i don’t know what the pitch count was going into the tenth but i bet it was around 130. after the game twins catcher brian harper said that some of morris’s warm up pitches in the tenth didn’t make it to the plate, but he still willed himself through that inning. morris didn’t win that game with pedro or clemens type talent, he won it with average talent and bull dog determination. the fact that morris never had pedro or clemens type talent is why he didn’t make the hall, but the fact that he did what he did without it, is the best thing about him.

Why aren’t they in the HOF already? I can clearly remember their names, their baseball cards, their stats and how awesome they were. By your standard they are all HOFers!

…incidentally I also remember Kevin Maas and Phil Plantier, but then I hoarded a bunch of their rookie cards so I may be a little bit influenced by that. But I remember their names so they are in dammit!

I know a lot of players from 20 years ago. I read your comment, and Pete Incaviglia’s name came to mind (though I had to look it up and check on the spelling). And then I thought of Brook Jacoby for some reason. And Pedro Guerrero.

If I’m reading your comment right, because we remember their names from 20 years ago, they are all Hall of Famers. Someone, please tell me I’m not reading your comment right.

I’m not familiar enough with Morris’ career to have an opinion on whether he belongs in the HOF, but I still agree with his main point. Fifteen years of no-talent suit-wearers trying to tear your life’s work down has got to be tiring.

“I’m not familiar enough with Morris’ career to have an opinion on whether he belongs in the HOF”

refreshing to see someone acknowledge that they don’t know everything about everything and therefore aren’t entitled to come to some bombastic judgement about everything and anything. i should probably hold myself to that standard more then i do.

i agree with the second part of your post too, except i’d add that morris must be feeling disappointed and saying that he’s relieved it’s over is a way of covering up that disappointment.

Even though I’m vehemently against Morris getting in the Hall, I can understand that it must be really irritating to read article after article about how overrated you are, and that you don’t belong in the Hall, etc., even though those are counter balanced by articles to the contrary. Morris is really an innocent bystander of this whole argument.

While true to some extent, if a large panel of “experts” convene and 50-70% of them repeatedly express a view (e.g. a vote for the HOF) that demonstrates that they think I was a lot better at something than I was….I wouldn’t mind if they kept doing it. Usually, witnessing someone think you are better than you are never grows tired. The problem here is that Morris thinks he was much better than he was, and that opinion largely is based on what the writers think of him (i.e. their votes).

I don’t know what the big deal is. Is the criteria for getting into the hall now being very good? This is a guy who never won a Cy Young, led the league in wins twice (once with 14), led the league in strikeouts once, had a career 3.90 ERA and 254 wins. Yawn. Next! I’m sure it’s Biggio fans whining about this.

Biggio doesn’t even remotely rank among the best among lead off hitters offensively. That’s simply untrue. And he won 4 gold gloves in 20 years. Let’s stop trying to make the guy a cross between Rickey Henderson and Ozzie Smith. I mean seriously, both of your statements are just a joke.

Yes, because the Hall of Fame cases of Biggio and Morris are so similar…

In fact, I would say a pretty vast majority of those who are against Morris in the Hall are for Biggio. Biggio’s case is pretty well loved in the sabermetric community and based on things like positional scarcity, OBP, lack of double plays, stealing bases at a high success rate. Not exactly things the Jack Morris crowd champions.

Do you think there’s a hitter who matches up with Jack Morris’s case? I wonder if it’s even possible, but there’s no one on the current ballot who comes to mind. I mean, the Morris Argument* is “His statistics may not be that impressive and he didn’t win many awards, but for 15 years, there was no pitcher you wanted more in a big game more than him. And he came through, like in 1991 World Series.”

* I do not endorse this argument.

Is there a hitter who maybe never won any MVP awards, didn’t put up eye-popping stats, but is still doing well on the ballot? Tony Perez is probably the closest hitter I can think of who matches up a bit with Morris. He’s in because he was a clutch hitter on great teams.

The Veterans committee is nothing like the old veterans committee in which players lobbied for their buddies and traded votes. Once all of that was put to a stop, the horrible choices by the veteran’s committee stopped. Heck, the new version of the committee took forever to elect a top 10 3B, who was the 3rdnd best 3B all-time when he retired, behind only Eddie Mathews and Brooks Robinson….of course, the writers screwed up his vote as well. I don’t think the assumption that Morris will fly through the Veteran committee process is justified….those guys should be far more aware that he was about the 5th or 6th best player on most of his teams, and most of the guys that were better than him (e.g. Darrell Evans, Trammell, Whittaker, Lemon, Parrish, Gibson…just from the Tigers).

Maybe he shouldn’t have spent so much time “pitching to the score” if, indeed, that really happened. It sound s like an excuse for giving up a lot of earned runs. So, again, I will say that Morris was and is no Hall of Famer.

Assuming you mean, does anyone think that Morris should have a realistic opinion of his career which shows that he is nothing like a HOF pitcher, yes, I think that….it isn’t hard at all for any player to look at the numbers and see how they stacked up….and if Morris bothered to look at the numbers (even traditional ones) rather than listening to the fawning BBWAA members, he’d have a hard time convincing himself that he belonged in the HOF when there are dozens of clearly better pitchers than he was that have never sniffed the HOF (and shouldn’t have).

If you had the exact same career as Jack Morris, you would want to be in the Hall of Fame. If you say differently, you’re a liar.

paperlions - Jan 26, 2014 at 11:58 AM

If I had the exact same career as Morris, and looked at all of the guys that put up far better numbers than me that are not in the HOF, and that I pitched during a pitchers era, and that my ERA would by FAR be the highest of any pitcher in the HOF, I would realize that I don’t belong in the HOF.

Not everyone is a self-centered narcissist. Some people understand very well exactly how good they are at things and how they compare to others.

Do me a favor and stop projecting and calling me a liar because I don’t think the way you do.

Thanks AAD, and I’ll add that to snub is to disdainfully reject, usually with the intent of insulting the snubee. Perhaps some voters had that in mind, but most who didn’t vote for him probably just didn’t think he deserved the honor of being included with the likes of Gibson, Koufax and Feller, you know, the very best of all time.

Or Catfish Hunter and Don Drysdale. You don’t have to be Bob Feller to be a Hall of Famer.

nothanksimdriving123 - Jan 27, 2014 at 1:39 AM

18thstreet, I did not intend the three names to be a comprehensive list, just examples of the very best of all time. Hunter and Big D would also make my list.

johnnycantread - Jan 25, 2014 at 6:56 PM

Morris should have taken a page out of ex-NFL player Harry Carson’s book.
Carson told the HOF voters that he wanted his name removed from the ballot… and they elected him!
Reminded me of “Red” Redding in “The Shawshank Redemption”: “So you go on and stamp your form, sonny, and stop wasting my time.”

I think he had a career worthy of being in the HOF, especially next to some in the past that I don’t think should have made it in. Just my opinion though, as I do think that wins and championships mean something.http://minoringinbaseball.com/